Thousands and Thousands of Lovers
Thousands and Thousands of Lovers examines the spiritual significance of community to the Cistercian nuns of Helfta — a concern that lies at the heart of the monastery’s literature. Focusing on a woefully understudied resource and the largest body of female-authored writings in the thirteenth century, this book offers insight into the religious preoccupations of a theologically expert and intellectually vibrant cloister to reveal a subtle interplay between communal practice and private piety, other-directed attention, and inward-religious impulse. It considers the nuns’ attitudes toward community among themselves and with their household members as well as with souls in purgatory and the saints.
Anna Harrison is professor of theological studies at Loyola Marymount University, where she teaches courses in the history of Christian late antiquity and the Middle Ages. She is currently at work on a monograph titled Paradox: Bernard of Clairvaux's On Loving God and Its Influence.
Information from Cistercian Publications
Anna HARRISON, Thousands and Thousands of Lovers. Sense of Community among the Nuns of Helfta, Collegeville, Liturgical Press, 2022 (Cistercian Publications).
TABLE DES MATIÈRES
Introduction
PART I : The Nuns
Chapter 1 – « Oh ! What Treasure Is in This Book?”: Writing, Reading, and Community
Chapter 2: “A Queen Is Magnanimous at Her King’s Banquet”: Relationships among the Nuns
Chapter 3 – “Tears and Sighs”: Community in Illness, Death, and Grief
Chapter 4 – “I am Wholly Your Own”: Liturgy and Community
PART II : Within and Beyond the Cloister
Chapter 5 – “A Husband Enjoys His Wife More Freely in Private”: The Nuns and the Clergy
Chapter 6 – “The People Are Also My Members”: Community Within and Beyond the Monastery
PART THREE : The Living and the Dead
Chapter 7 – “Give Her All That Is Yours”: Community and the Population of Purgatory
Chapter 8 – “Unite Yourself with His Family”: Community with Mary and the Saints
Epilogue
Bibliography
Index